Has anyone had severe side effects after surgery? I feel like I am the only one struggling to find my voice in groups or forums.

Hi Jenna, I think it would be helpful if you were to disclose what the side effects are that you are having? There are a lot of people here that have had surgery many years ago and are generous enough to chime in and give assistance to try and help figure out what is going on and maybe how to make it better.

Of course that is after you've explored all options with your surgical team, they really should be your first call.

Hope you get some answers, and start feeling better.

I did. That's why I had to have a revision. What side effects are you having? What surgery did you have?

I had the gastric sleeve surgery in December of 2022. Upon being released to go home 6 hours later I fell off my bed and stopped breathing. I was rushed to the hospital that did my surgery and arrived DOA(dead on arrival) I was in full organ failure and place in an induced coma. None of the doctors know what happened but I ended up waking up in the ICU with memory loss due to being without oxygen for 17 minutes. I also had a heart condition, kidney failure and severe left side weakness and unable to walk without assistance.

My goodness, that's a very severe incident. Given the very low complication rate for your surgery, I would guess you might only find a handful of people in the country who had an experience like that. Since it's been a year, I'm curious how have things gone since that time? Have you made a full recovery? Have you had additional issues? Did they ever figure out what happened?

16 hours ago, JennaW87 said:

I had the gastric sleeve surgery in December of 2022. Upon being released to go home 6 hours later I fell off my bed and stopped breathing. I was rushed to the hospital that did my surgery and arrived DOA(dead on arrival) I was in full organ failure and place in an induced coma. None of the doctors know what happened but I ended up waking up in the ICU with memory loss due to being without oxygen for 17 minutes. I also had a heart condition, kidney failure and severe left side weakness and unable to walk without assistance.

My god that is terrible and I wish you all the best.

I had sleeve surgery in 2023 and had side effects but nothing to that extent and I am not sure what was due to possible hospital errors or just bad luck for me.

I ended up with severe pancreatis and then infections because of a hole in my stomach. The hospital tried a few attempts of clipping the hole but that didn't work and now I have a coil/tube in the hole to hopefully have the hole heal around it over the next few months. If that doesn't work I may have to get bypass.

I spent three months in hospital instead of just the one expected night, some for weeks on a feeding tube , had to get a transfusion and a lot of antibiotics. I am suffering severe exhaustion, not sleeping well and at times feeling quite down. I can't walk far without feeling weak and if I do something one day (like go to supermarket) I need the next day to recover. At times I question if I would have been better going down the medication route, but as I don't have diabetes and there are no studies yet available on how the injections impact long term I thought surgery was the safer bet, I really doubt that now. I still get stomach pains at times and I honestly don't know if that is due to the surgery complications or if everyone gets them. I nearly called for an ambulance on new years day I was in so much pain.

I keep trying to be strong for my family, as they don't live in the same country as me and get very worried, but I find it is adding to my exhaustion. Some days I just have a bit of a cry as I feel there is no-one to compare myself to and it is all such an effort.

Holy hell, that's an insane amount of complications!!! Do your doctors think they are from the specific type of surgery you ad, or maybe from having a major surgery in itself?